With countless songs, artists and albums quite literally at our fingertips, it is difficult to imagine how listening to music could be much more convenient. But then again, even digital music does still involve some form of music player, be it an iPod, smartphone or computer. Streamz are a pair of smart Wi-Fi-enabled headphones that are designed to streamline the experience further thanks to an inbuilt Bluetooth Android music player.
The headphones weigh 17.5 oz (496 g), have a frequency range of 20 Hz to 20 kHz, dynamic range of 115 dB, and feature a built-in 48 kHz/16 bit Digital Analog Converter (DAC) and amp. With a Wi-FI 802.11 b/g/n module inside, Streamz can wirelessly receive audio from a smartphone, from streaming services such as Spotify and Pandora, or from cloud services such as Google Drive. Music can also be stored on the device itself, which has up to 36 GB of storage and is compatible with formats including FLAC, ALAC, MP3 and WAV. With the use of an optional Bluetooth transmitter, the headphones can also be used to listen to audio from a home entertainment system or TV.
At present, the company has built four control buttons into either earpiece, with the buttons on the right side for play, pause, skip and reverse, while buttons over the left ear control volume, mode and function. With Streamz currently the subject of a Kickstarter campaign, the company is hoping to raise enough funds to build voice commands into the final product.
Streamz runs on a lithium-polymer battery which can be recharged via a 5 VDC charger. A pledge of US$299 will put you in line for a 4 GB set of the smart headphones, which the company says is $200 less than the retail value. It plans to begin shipping in August 2014 if all goes to plan.
You can hear from the team behind Streamz in the video below.
Source: Streamz
You must not be paying attention to the reality rate of crowd sourced tech projects, especially audio related projects. It's abysmal. Now that would be worth a story.